Makepeace High
by BEES BEES BEES
Summary: Alfendi's a completely normal fifteen-year-old, except for his split personalities and obsession with murder mysteries. He's at a new school that has the same name as two serial killers. Things get stranger. No one at the school is human, and there's rumors of ghosts haunting the school.
1. Chapter 1

"Where are we going, exactly?" I asked my father, Professor Hershel Layton.

I only knew we were going to some boarding school, and that Flora would be somewhere else. That's what made me nervous. Why was I going to the weird boarding school a few hours from home? Hopefully it had nothing to do with my split personality disorder...

My father kept his eyes trained on the road because it was raining badly, making it hard to see. "A friend recommended this school called Makepeace High."

Instantly, my potty side (that's what Flora called it) appeared. "Makepeace? I read about a guy named Keelan Makepeace. He was a murderer, but then he got killed. His daughter was really insane because of that, and she became a killer...And then she got murdered, too, in the same way Keelan did...They haven't solved it, I don't think. But I didn't know other people had that last name. I thought they just protected them by using a fake name or something."

"That's very strange." My father furrowed his brow. "The school was named after a construction worker who was murdered...His daughter was too..."

My placid side returned. (Again, a nickname from Flora.) I rubbed my chin. "Well that's odd..."

Flora let out a breath of relief. Sometimes when my potty side appeared, she held her breath for some reason. It kind of hurt knowing that I scared her so badly. Maybe the idea of a boarding school was a good idea...

_What are you thinking?!_ my potty side yelled. _Why would you think this is a good idea?! This is horrible! Sending me away...This is just the thing my father would do!_

I stared out the window. To me, it looked like the raindrops were racing. Occasionally I tapped on the window to hurry along the raindrops if they stopped sliding down the window.

The car pulled into a crowded parking lot near a building that definitely looked like a school. I looked at the sign on the building:

* * *

**MAKEPEACE HIGH!**

**HOME OF THE PYTHONS!**

* * *

_Well at least there's a cool mascot,_ I thought, looking at the symbol. It was a large dark python circled around a smaller identical python. I thought about the book with Keelan and Diane Makepeace. If those were real people, maybe Keelan Makepeace was the construction worker who died! So basically I was in a school that was possibly named after two serial killers.

That made it hard to keep my potty side under control. I opened the door, put my backpack over one shoulder, and pulled out my suitcase. Flora and my father stepped out of the car.

"Now don't worry Al. We're just a few hours away, and we're going to visit you a lot," my father said. "Okay?"

_Well that's great,_ growled my potty side.

Before I knew it, I was crushed in a hug by Flora and my father. I couldn't breathe. They let go after a few minutes, which is kind of long for a hug.

"Bye Al! We'll visit you soon." My father smiled.

"Bye Al!" Flora waved. "Bye!"

"Bye."

The car drove away. I headed into the school, noting all the students bustling around the hallway.

They weren't exactly...normal.

Some people were part animal, like a horse, a goat, a bear, or a cat. There were also people with wings, or fangs, or wild animals following them. I frowned and looked at the billboard showing our rooms and room-mates. The teachers put two people to a room. My room was room thirty-three, and my room-mate was a guy named Dustin Scowers. I had no idea who he was, but I hoped he was someone who was more normal than the other students. Although I did have split personalities, I felt normal compared to those people.

I picked up my suitcase and went to room thirty-three. To my relief, my room-mate looked like a normal human. Then again, there could be some time of animal ears hiding under his white fedora or something like that. Dustin had orange hair tied into a braid and bangs that completely covered his eyes, a blue polo shirt, jeans, and black tennis shoes. His nose was kind of pointy, like mine, but it was more like a knife...covered with...freckles...

"'Ello," he said. "You're Alfendi? My name's Dustin."

"Hi." I smiled faintly.

"I'm so glad they didn't put me wiv my bro Doug. I mean, he's cool 'n' all, but I get tired o' bein' in the same room as 'im all the time."

"Is he human too?" I asked.

"Too?" Dustin shook his head, and I just got a small glimpse of his blue eyes. "I ain't a 'uman. Sorry dude. But no, 'e isn't 'uman either. We're both semi-mers."

I raised an eyebrow. "Semi-mer...?"

"Oh it's a, uh, part 'uman part merman-er, mermaid, if yer a girl...Ye just get a tail under t' water, is all. Oh, an' you c'n breathe underwater, too." He nodded.

"Cool." I furrowed my brow. "That's, um, strange...Like, no one's human here! It's weird."

"Are you human?"

"Uh..." I stared at the floor. "I guess not...I don't know." I considered the question. Was I human? I always thought I was, but maybe I wasn't as human as I thought...

Dustin looked at his watch. "It's twelve. We'd better head to lunch. I can show ya all me friends, if ye want."

I shrugged. "I don't know anyone here. Sure."

"I don't think we 'ave anything to do. The teachers are smart. They gave us a weekend off to get used to t' school 'n' then we 'ave class on Monday."

_There's a lot of stuff to get used to in this school,_ I thought.

I followed Dustin to the cafeteria. We loaded up our trays and went to a table with five people sitting there. Two seats were empty.

Dustin sat down next to a girl with stringy brown hair, a magenta sweater, black pants, and an IV stuck in her wrist. She was breathing out of her mouth, so I assumed her nose was probably stuffed.

"'Ello sunshine." Dustin gave the girl a lopsided smile.

The girl smiled back. "Hi Dustin."

I sat in a chair next to a girl with a dark green hoodie, khaki pants, and a pink ball cap. I couldn't help noticing her pointed ears.

"I like your ears," I said instantly. Why did I say that?!

"Ee, ta very much." She ducked her head. "I try to keep 'em 'idden but my hair won't stay over 'em..."

"Okay so this is Florence." Dustin pointed to the girl next to him. "That's Lucy." He gestured to the girl next to me. "There's Sniffer-well, 'is real name is Hague, but ev'ryone 'ere calls 'im Sniffer."

Sniffer had puffy orange hair, a white headband, a nose that was pointy in the same way as Dustin's, glasses, a trench coat (it was too warm for that, though), a brown shirt, and jeans. He was listening to music, but he waved at me.

"That's Hilda."

Hilda had long curly blonde hair, blue eyes, an upturned nose, lipstick (pretty fancy for school), a gray T-shirt with a sparkly paw print on it, a red plaid skirt, _blond cat ears_, and a_ cat tail._

I opened my mouth to say something but stopped short. Instead, I just pointed at her with a confused expression on my face. Hilda looked as confused as I was.

Dustin just went on normally. Clearly people in Makepeace High were used to stuff like humans with cat ears. "And that's Justin."

Justin's skin was some sort of orange color. His brown hair was in a ponytail, like mine, and one of his eyes was closed. He was dressed in an olive-green T-shirt with a skull on it, dark jeans, and a black leather bracelet on each wrist. Justin chewed on a toothpick.

Something about that guy was daunting. I nervously took a sip of some milk and tried not to stare at him directly. Hilda flicked her cat tail and picked at her lunch. It was awkwardly silent.

"Why is it so quiet?" Florence asked, and then she coughed. "I mean, we're usually talking non...non...Achoo! We're usually talking non-stop!" She took a tissue from her pocket. "So, what's your name?" she asked me.

"Um, Alfendi, but you can call me Al."

Florence blew her nose and tried to nod at the same time.

Justin took the toothpick out of his mouth. "Alfendi? Is that German?" he asked.

I shrugged. "Maybe. I just think that my dad likes weird names."

"And what, you know, humanoid are you?" Florence asked.

"Uh...I don't know. I'm not sure if I'm human or not, really."

"Oh." Florence shrugged. "That's okay. I mean, I'm human, but I'm also psychic. And I can levitate stuff. Are you psychic, too?"

I shook my head.

"Huh." Florence coughed again.

"Well ya don't 'ave to tell if ya don't want to," Dustin said. "Lucy 'ere doesn't like people to know what she is."

Lucy's cheeks turned pink, and she stared at her hands.

Sniffer took out his ear buds. "I'll tell you that I'm a were-hare. Means I turn into a rabbit on the full moon. But you don't want to mess with me then 'cause if I accidentally bite you, you'll go insane...Yeah..." Sniffer cleared his throat. "Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned that." He stared at his food sheepishly.

"Have you ever heard of a Man-Wolf?" Justin asked.

I shook my head.

"Well that's what I am. It's cool. I can turn into some wolf thing...Not exactly a wolf...It's kind of hard to explain, but I can show you now if you want me to."

"Um, Justin?" Sniffer raised an eyebrow and fixed his glasses. "I don't think that's a good idea in the middle of lunch..."

"Yeah, probably not. Later, then." Justin shrugged and put the toothpick back in his mouth.

"I just remembered something!" Sniffer exclaimed. He looked around for eavesdroppers and then whispered, "We saw another ghost attack this morning."

My potty side appeared. "Ghosts?"

Everyone at the table looked shocked, except Lucy. She was just confused.

My placid side returned, filled with regret. "Uh...I can explain..."

"Split-ACHOO!-personalities?" Florence asked. "I didn't know that was real."

I found that odd considering they weren't really human.

"Um...Yeah..." I rubbed the back of my neck. Then my potty side appeared again. "But what's this about a ghost? That sounds so cool!"

Sniffer coughed nervously. "Okay, well let me explain first. Recently, there's been a lot of strange stuff going on."

"Like what?"

"People hearing weird voices," said Justin, "creepy messages being written on walls and mirrors, that sort of stuff."

"Whoa," I breathed. "So this school could be haunted?"

Sniffer nodded. "Maybe. That's what we think, anyway. But it's kinda secret. If other people knew, they'd be teasing us non-stop...Back to what we saw. Today the ghost got all of my shoes and all of Justin's shoes, and then the ghost arranged them into a giant smiley face in the middle of the floor. Creepy, huh?"

"You want to know something else weird?" I pulled a book out of my backpack and flipped to the section about the Makepeaces. "Look at this. They're killers who both got murdered. Do you think the school's named after them? I heard it was named after a construction worker and his daughter because they both died before the workers finished building the school. What if they're the ghosts?"

"Dead fishy, that." Lucy shook her head. "If they are t' same people, that would be creepy." She pointed to the book. "They're killers! We're in a school named after serial killers? That's just weird..."

I nodded. "But it's awesome!"

"We should do something about it," Hilda said. "Maybe we could find the ghosts." Her tail flicked excitedly. "That would be so cool! Don't you think?"

"What if they're-" Florence interrupted herself with a few coughs. "-dangerous? They could kill us!"

"I think we'll be fine." Dustin shrugged. "If it gets too dangerous, we c'n just tell t' principal 'bout it. He could help us."

"He won't take us seriously," Lucy pointed out. "What principal would believe a few students sayin' t' school is haunted?"

"Well, we're more than a few," Justin said. "We're, like, seven students. Maybe he'd believe us then."

Lucy snorted and rolled her eyes. "I still think he won't believe us."

"Looking for ghosts would be cool." My placid side didn't like the idea.

Hilda looked at the clock. "It's twelve forty-two. Come on, we gotta go before everyone else leaves!"

We dumped our trays.

"Where should we go?" Florence asked.

"Well, we can't go to my room," remarked Lucy. "Dolly Hollerday's my room-mate, and I'm not sure if I want her to know what we're doing..."

"What about our room?" Sniffer suggested.

Justin shrugged. "Fine by me."

"Let's go!" Dustin said in a jokingly heroic way.


	2. Chapter 2

Some of us sat on the floor and some sat on the beds. It was pretty crowded in Sniffer and Justin's room.

"Where would t' ghosts be 'iding, do ya think?" Dustin asked.

My placid side had already returned. I definitely didn't like the idea of looking for ghosts, but I had already gotten myself into the mess. I rubbed my chin and thought about where ghosts would be. "Is there a basement to this school? Maybe they're in the basement if there even is one."

"There might be," Florence said. "But if there is a basement, it's probably locked. And I don't think they'd let-Achoo!-I don't think they'd let students in there, anyways. We'd have to, like, break in."

"Sounds good to me," Justin remarked.

Sniffer raised an eyebrow.

Justin cleared his throat. "I mean, uh, breaking in is wrong...Nah, we should still do it. We'd just have to find the door."

Lucy furrowed her brow. "Where would a basement be?"

"I 'ave an idea!" Dustin exclaimed. "What 'bout those doors that we just assume are supply closets or janitor's closets? Maybe one's a door to t' basement."

"If there is one," Sniffer added. "Not every place has a basement. So there might not be one at all."

"We should still check," I said.

"Let's go." Hilda jumped up from the floor. "C'mon!"

"Wait! Achoo!What if it's locked? We'd need an excuse to get down there. And what if somebody finds us there? Like I said, they probably don't let students in the basement, if there is one anyways." Florence sniffed.

Hilda shrugged. "It's not like they specifically told us not to go down to the basement. Technically, we don't know the rules yet."

Florence shrugged. "I suppose that's good enough. Alright, let's go."

We left the room.

"Okay so we need to find some supply closet," Lucy said. "Or a door that doesn't lead to a classroom."

"What about there?" Justin pointed to a gray door.

We hurried to the door. Dustin twisted the knob and opened the door.

"Huh," I said. "It's actually a janitor's closet."

"Well, they don't need many janitor's closets," Florence said. "So there's probably-" Florence coughed. "-just one or two of them. Ugh. Stupid allergies..." She blew her nose into a tissue.

Dustin closed the door and led us to another one. It was a supply closet.

"Okay, this is weird," Hilda muttered.

"I'm just glad this school only has one floor!" Lucy exclaimed. "Well, I supposed there's the basement, making it two floors...But wot if we had to check on three different floors? That would take us forever!"

"And there's my IV." Florence frowned.

"Ah-ha!" Sniffer waved crazily, gesturing that we should come over towards him. I didn't even notice him leaving the group.

"Wot is it?" Dustin asked.

"Look at this door." Sniffer tugged on the doorknob. "It's locked. Do you think it's the door to the basement?"

"Totally." Lucy nodded.

"Now we just need the keys." I rubbed my chin. "Or we could pick the lock, I suppose."

"Anyone know 'ow to pick locks?" Dustin asked.

No one did.

"So we need to find the keys." Hilda's cat ear twitched. "I doubt the principal will just give it to us."

"So we break in?" asked Justin. "Maybe one of us can distract the principal while another one grabs the key...Or maybe Florence can levitate it over or something..."

Sniffer slapped his forehead. "And you wonder why you went to jail."

"It was juvee," Justin snapped. "That's very different from jail. It's not like I murdered someone!"

"That's a good plan, actually," I replied slowly. As you can guess, I was my potty side. Through my red hair, I couldn't see my friends' nervous expressions. "Is there any time when the principals are out of their office?"

Everyone considered the question.

"Well, there's pretty much always one of 'em there," Lucy said.

I rubbed my chin. "So we just need a way to draw the principals out of the office..."

"We could use fake blood," Justin replied.

"Fake blood is always a good answer," I remarked, "but how exactly would we use that?"

"Well...One of us could fake an injury..." mumbled Sniffer.

"Good idea," I said. "See? Fake blood really is a good answer. Sparks creativity."

Lucy shook her head. "I don't think that would cause them to get out of t' office, though. It would make t' nurse come."

"Not if the nurse is out!" Florence replied.

"Oh, good point." Lucy nodded. "So we just get t' nurse out of 'er office..."

"I know!" Dustin exclaimed. "Okay, so we make a fake note to t' nurse. It c'n be somethin' like-Oh, it c'n be a guy tellin' her to go somewhere for a date!"

"Shh!" Florence hissed. "Do you want people to overhear us?"

My placid side had already returned. "That's an excellent idea, Dustin. Who can do a good note like that?"

Justin shrugged. "I can, I guess."

"We should probably do that after school Monday," Justin said. "That seems like a realistic time for someone to go on a date. But what about the injury? How do we do that?"

"I could do t' injury," replied Lucy. "But no blood! Ee, they'd know it were fake. They can just tell stuff like that."

"You could pretend to sprain your ankle," Hilda suggested.

"But that makes me seem like a damsel in distress!" Lucy crossed her arms.

"Well you can't really do a-Achoo!-broken ankle," Florence said.

Lucy shrugged. "I suppose. Okay, I'll do it."

"Back to my room," Sniffer said. "Then there's less of chance of people eavesdropping there."

We went back to Sniffer and Justin's room.

"I'll start on the note," Justin said. He sat down at the desk and took out a sheet of paper.

"We should start this after dinner, don't you think?" Dustin said. "Maybe we leave a few minutes early 'n' then Lucy pretends to trip on somethin'."

Lucy nodded. "Monday, then? Okay. I never pretended to sprain anything before."

"You'll be fine." Hilda shrugged. "Just keep them distracted."

"I'll get the-" Florence interrupted herself with a few coughs. "-keys from the office. But I can't go very fast, okay? Try to keep them distracted long enough for me to get the keys and leave."

Lucy nodded. "Can do."

Justin sprayed some cologne on the note. "And...Done. The nurse will like this. So, who's delivering it?" He slipped the note into an envelope.

"I guess I will," I said. "When should I put it in her office?"

"Just slide it under the door anytime," Sniffer instructed. "Maybe before dinner today. You mentioned Monday, right, Justin?"

Justin nodded.

"Okay. And if the nurse sees you, that would be kind of awkward...You could probably make up an excuse or something. I dunno."

I nodded and grabbed the note.

* * *

"Good luck," Lucy whispered. I left the group and went towards the nurse's office, remembering the directions Florence gave me to find the place.

**Miss Wipovsky**, the sign on the door said. I glanced around for other students or teachers. No one was there. Carefully, I slid the note under the door and hurried to catch up with my friends. I met them in the line.

"You-ACHOO!-got it in there?" Florence asked.

I nodded.

"And no one-" She sniffed. "-saw you?"

I nodded again.

"Great! So tomorrow we just distract the, the-ACHOO!-principals when the nurse is gone."

"What time did you put on the note?" Sniffer asked Justin.

"Six thirty," replied Justin. "Figured we could be a few minutes late for dinner."

"Worth it to figure out 'bout these ghosts," Dustin said.


	3. Chapter 3

I looked at my schedule. It said:

**Science: Ms. Knox**

**History: Hen**

**English: Mr. Nicks**

**P.E.: Mr. Felps**

**-Lunch-**

**Art: Mr. Mann**

**Math: Mr. Sasacusa**

"Who's this Hen?" I asked Dustin.

Dustin shrugged. "Some teachers in this school are some sort of animal 'uman 'ybrids er, whatever ya call it, and that's one of 'em. There's also Dog, Cat, Pig, Donkey...It's really weird. I don't even know what to call 'em!"

"Oh. Do you know where Ms. Knox's class is?"

Dustin nodded. "We're in t' same class. Just follow me."

"Okay." I followed him to science class.

Ms. Knox had red eyes and blue hair. I guessed that was probably normal compared to everyone else in the school. We did absolutely nothing of interest. All we did was talk about science procedures and rules.

The bell rang after what seemed like forever.

Now history class was really strange. Hen actually looked like a giant hen in a pink dress. Lucy was next to me, trying not to laugh out loud.

"Och! I'm Hen, your history teacher," she squawked.

A few feathers went up and floated around. Florence sneezed loudly.

Hen was definitely the most interesting teacher. I didn't pay much attention to class because I was thinking about what we'd be doing after school.

English class.

Mr. Nicks looked like a thief. Literally, he had on a bandit mask and dark clothing. Also he had a bushy gray and black striped tail and little raccoon ears on the top of his head. I frowned and sat down.

"What...?" I began.

"Raccoon goblin," Dustin explained.

"Oh." I had no idea what that meant.

Seeing my confused expression, Dustin said, "Uh, means 'e's kind of part raccoon."

"Ohhh." It started to make sense. "So that's why he has the mask and everything. He looks like a thief."

Dustin nodded.

P.E.

Mr. Felps looked as stronger than Justin, which would be pretty strong.

We didn't do anything in P.E., really.

We just got our outfits for dressing out and messed around with basketballs and jump ropes.

It felt like I was wearing pajamas, honestly. And that is _not_ a good feeling for school. Florence stood awkwardly near the bleachers because she couldn't do P.E. with her IV. Lucy was really good at jump roping.

"Where did you learn that?" I asked.

"I don't know, really," Lucy replied. She continued jump roping as she spoke.

"Wow." I looked at Sniffer, Justin, and Dustin (heh heh that rhymes) playing basketball. It was either basketball, jump rope, or standing around. I didn't like any of the choices, so I decided to just chat with Lucy as she jump roped.

"How come you don't want people to know what humanoid whatever you are?" I asked. Honestly, I was just curious.

"Ee, most people like me are girly." Lucy stopped talking for a few seconds. "And I'm not girly, you know. Not at all."

I nodded.

Florence whispered something to Hilda. It made her laugh a bit, whatever Florence said. Somehow I could tell they were talking about Lucy or me. I frowned and looked at them. It was impossible to tell exactly what they were saying, unfortunately.

"Wot are they gossiping about over there?" Lucy wondered. She stopped jump roping and looked at them.

I shook my head. "No idea."

We met up at lunch like we usually did. And, as usual, I sat next to Lucy.

"I can't believe we're doing this," Hilda whispered excitedly. Her long cat tail flicked. "We're actually stealing keys to find ghosts in the basement. It's like Scooby Doo in school! But this is so much better because it's actually real!"

"Except the ghosts could still be dangerous," Florence remarked. "We can't rule that out yet. I mean, they _are_ haunting everything."

"You're the voice of reason," Justin said, "the Jimminy Cricket. So you can understand why we won't listen to you."

Florence snorted-either from allergies or trying to suppress a laugh.

* * *

I glanced out the window. Most people were eating dinner, but Miss Wipovsky was leaving the building. She was a large woman with hair kind of like Sniffer's, but it wasn't puffed up like his. Based on her name, she was probably Polish, but I couldn't tell for sure. I gave Florence a thumbs-up, and she repeated the gesture to Lucy. She nodded.

Lucy pretended to trip over something and fall. "Ow! My ankle! I...I think I twisted it!"

The vice-principal came out of the office. "What the-? Oh, of course. Right when the nurse is out. Barton! Get over here!"

The principal followed the vice-principal towards Lucy, who was being all dramatic.

Florence went into the office. I stared out the window. Miss Wipovsky was in a red car, driving away. I kept watch in case she came back. What would happen when no one was waiting for her at...wherever she was going? What place did Justin put on the card, anyway? After a few minutes, Florence came out of the office door.

"I got it," she whispered. "Come on, let's-Achoo!-go. Quick, before they see us!"

We hurried to the cafeteria. Lucy saw us leave but tried to keep up the act. The principals didn't see us at all.

"What happens to Lucy now?" I asked Florence.

Florence shrugged. "I guess they'll think she's overreacting or something like that."

We went to the cafeteria for dinner. Lucy came out of the lunch line ten minutes later and sat down breathlessly.

"What 'appened?" Dustin asked.

"I ran when they looked away so I wouldn't have to explain why my ankle wasn't hurt at all." Lucy sighed. "Just glad they didn't catch me...Did you get the keys?"

Florence nodded.

"When do we go to the basement?" I asked.

"Tomorrow, I guess," replied Hilda. "Maybe during lunch. I dunno."

"After school would be best," Justin said. "We could go right after we put our backpacks in our rooms."

"Ee, I hope my room-mate won't ask where I'm going," Lucy remarked. "Should I explain it to her, or...?"

Sniffer shook his head. "Who knows what other people would say about this? You could make up an excuse, maybe. If she's suspicious of you, that could be bad. Especially if she follows us, and if we actually find the ghosts!"

Lucy nodded.

I couldn't wait to see what was in the basement.

* * *

**Fixed the teacher problem. XD Why do I keep putting Randal Mann as weird adult characters?!**


	4. Chapter 4

The bell rang at the end of the school day. Seven students bolted to their rooms and dropped their backpacks. Everyone else wondered what the hurry was.

I followed Dustin to the door. Everyone else was there already.

"Oh good, you're here," Sniffer said.

"Where are you guys even going?"

We turned around. A girl was standing there. She had short black hair, blue eye shadow, bright red lipstick, and sharp fangs (I assumed she was a vampire, and I was correct).

"Oh...Hi Dolly." Lucy straightened up. She gave a sideways glance to Florence, who was hiding the key in behind her back.

"You guys are acting really suspicious." Dolly crossed her arms.

"We're just showing, er, Alfendi...The place..." Sniffer replied nervously. "We're going to the, um, library! Yeah. That's where we were going."

"Well you're going the total opposite direction," Dolly remarked.

"Scenic route." Sniffer held his breath after he answered her sharply.

"...Okay then..." Dolly raised an eyebrow. "You people are really weird."

"Let's go," Justin said through gritted teeth.

We followed him away.

"What did you tell Dolly?" Hilda whispered as we were walking.

"Nowt!" Lucy put her hands in the pockets of her hoodie (which was the same one as what she wore everyday, or maybe she just had a lot of the same jacket). "She were on her phone when I were in t' room, so I just didn't say anything. I didn't think she noticed me!"

"Let's just try to avoid suspicion for now," Dustin said.

"Which is hard to do. You need to learn how to lie better!" Florence glared at Sniffer.

"Well sorry," replied Sniffer.

"Next time, I do all the lying," said Justin. "I'm good at it."

"You're also good at escaping from handcuffs." Sniffer looked at Justin. "And getting arrested."

Justin shrugged. "Yeah. But how many times do I have to tell you?! It. Was. Juvee."

To avoid suspicion, we didn't go back to the basement that day.

* * *

It was a full moon that night.

Someone knocked on the door, and Dustin answered it.

"Have you seen an orange rabbit with golden teeth running around?" Justin asked.

Dustin shook his head.

"Darn it. Sniffer escaped. Uh...If you do see him, just don't let him bite you!" Justin left.

"That was...weird..." Dustin closed the door and went back to his bed.

I stared out the window. Then I noticed someone out there, dancing. It was some sort of beautiful ballet. The girl looked familiar...

I opened up the window. "Lucy?"

Lucy stopped and turned around. Her cheeks were red. "Oh...Hi Al."

"What dance was that?" I asked.

"Ee, I were just practicing...for...my dance class." Lucy laughed nervously.

"It was really good." I nodded.

"Thanks." Lucy smiled.

I closed the window and turned around to see Dustin staring at me.

"What?" I asked.

"I think yer in love, mate," Dustin stated matter-of-factly.

"I am not." I crossed my arms.

"Sure ye aren't." Dustin smiled mysteriously.

I slapped my forehead.

* * *

We tried to go to the basement again the next day.

Lucy came with her backpack on. "I didn't stop in my room," she said. "I just went here. You think Dolly will be suspicious now?"

I shrugged. "Probably not."

Florence glanced around. When she was sure no one was watching us, Florence unlocked the door. We went through the door. The whole group carefully headed down the stairs. Justin flicked on the lights.

There were a _lot_ of ghosts there.

"Whoa..." I breathed.

"What?" Hilda asked. She flicked her cat ears.

"The ghosts. Don't you see them?" I frowned.

Hilda shook her head.

"Okay...That's odd..." I looked around the room. There definitely were ghosts in the basement, but somehow other people couldn't see them. "Can anyone see them?"

No one did. (Well, Lucy didn't answer.) We climbed the stairs again and locked the door.

"I'll go put this back," Justin whispered. He grabbed the key from Florence and walked to the office.

"Won't he get caught?" I asked.

Sniffer shook his head. "Nah. Justin knows how to sneak around and stuff like that."

We headed to the library. (Honestly, we just didn't know where to go.) I looked at some books. Maybe I could find something on ghosts that would explain it all. Lucy followed me to the bookshelf. I awkwardly focused on the books to avoid her gaze. _What the heck is wrong with you?_ my potty side growled. I looked for a book on ghosts. Since this was a strange school, they had lots of books on humanoids and stuff like that.

"This might be helpful." Lucy handed me a book called_ Ghosts &amp; Spirits._

"Thanks." I checked out the book and went to the desk.

When Lucy sat down next to me, I tensed up. Dustin noticed that and started to chuckle.

"What?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Nothin'." Dustin tried not to laugh loudly.

Hilda whispered something to Florence. Florence snorted and nodded.

"Wot are you whispering about?" Lucy demanded. She clearly seemed annoyed.

"Nothing." Hilda smiled.

I sighed and opened my book. The introduction was boring, just talking about the difference between ghosts and spirits. Then it started to get a little more interesting. It said that only certain people could see ghosts. So that explained it.

* * *

I walked through the halls on Wednesday. (It was after we had seen the ghosts. I stayed at the library a little later than everyone else.) Then I passed by a room where music was playing. I stopped walking and backed up a bit to look through the door. Lucy was wearing a green T-shirt, black leggings, and no shoes. She was practicing a dance, but not the one she was doing outside on that full moon. When Lucy turned, I panicked a little, but she had her eyes closed. I let out a breath of relief, thinking, _Something is seriously wrong with me._ I walked back to my room.

"Where were you?" Dustin asked.

"Uh, I was walking here." Lies. Gosh, when did I start getting so secretive?

"Sure about that?" Dustin raised an eyebrow. "'Cause the way you were going, you could 'ave passed the dance class. Isn't Lucy in dance?"

"Okay yes I was going past the dance room," my potty side quipped. "What's your point?"

"Interesting." Dustin rubbed his chin. "Very interesting..."

* * *

**Okay there will be a little romance. I don't like romance except for Alfendi X Lucy. But the main part of this isn't the romance.**

**And sorry that it took a little while to get this chapter. I'm currently battling writers' block.**


	5. Chapter 6

In the hallway, I passed by Lucy and Dolly on Sunday.

"That's the boy you keep talking about, right?" Dolly asked Lucy.

"Shut up!" Lucy hissed.

"Does he know-"

"Shut _up_!" Lucy punched her shoulder.

Dolly giggled.

My cheeks were pink. I awkwardly continued waking.

"You should talk to him," I heard Dolly saying behind me.

Now my cheeks were definitely a shade of red.

"Hey Alfendi!" Dolly yelled.

I stopped and turned around.

"_Lucy_ has something to say to you." Dolly nudged Lucy.

"I do not!" Lucy protested. Her cheeks were a deep shade of crimson.

Dolly started laughing.

My potty side appeared. I bit my lip. "I'm gonna...go..." I hurried to the library.

I returned the book on ghosts since I wasn't using in anymore. Then I grabbed a Sherlock Holmes book and sat down at the desk to read. (By then, my placid side had already returned.) Someone else sat down at the table. I didn't pay any mind to them. After a few seconds, I glanced up to see what time it was. Then I saw that person who sat down at the table was Lucy.

"Oh crud!" I nearly fell out of my chair in surprise.

"Sorry to scare you!" Lucy exclaimed.

"Shhh!" the librarian hissed.

"Sorry," we both mumbled.

Lucy looked at the book I was reading. "Hey, I've read that."

"You like Sherlock Holmes?"

Lucy nodded. "I love mysteries."

"Me too." I smiled at her.

Awkward silence.

"So, uh..." I coughed. "What was Dolly talking about in the hallway?" Did Lucy really talk about me a lot? What did she say? Did Dolly know about my split personalities?

Lucy laughed nervously. "Er...Dolly makes things up...A lot...?" Lucy rubbed the back of her neck, which I did sometimes.

I raised an eyebrow. _Well now she's picking up our habits,_ said my potty side. "This is awkward," I stated, well, awkwardly.

Lucy nodded. I bit the inside of my cheek.

"Lucy!" Dolly exclaimed.

"Ugh, what do you want?"

"Well I was going to take you to the mall."

Lucy crossed her arms. "Dolly, you know I hate malls and shopping and changing rooms and skirts and dresses..."

Dolly smiled. "You need to look pretty if you're starting to date. Besides, I got this gift card."

"I'm not dating," Lucy grumbled. "Anyways, you're a vampire. How are you gonna go outside?"

"Sunscreen." Dolly grabbed Lucy's arm and yanked her up. "Come on, dear."

"Don't 'dear' me." Lucy scowled.

I found myself wondering what she would look like in a dress. Green, of course. Lucy always wore green. Maybe she would have pink headband or something...I shook my head. Something was definitely wrong with me. Then I thought about what Dustin said that one full moon. He thought I was in love...Well, if he was right, being in love is really weird.

* * *

There were no ghost attacks on Monday. Luckily, my father didn't visit on Sunday. (Wouldn't want my friends comparing me to my dad like almost everyone else.) He must have been busy at work.

Again, I sat down by Lucy at breakfast. I did that every time we were in the cafeteria, but I didn't know why. My phone suddenly rang, scaring the crud out of all of us.

I answered it. "Hello?"

"Hey Al," my father said.

Darn it. "Hi...dad..."

"Sorry I couldn't visit you this weekend. I was busy with my job."

Just as I thought. "It's okay."

"Did you make any friends there?"

I nodded, but then I remembered he couldn't see me through the phone. "Yeah."

"Cool, well-" He paused for a few seconds. I heard a muffled voice. "Okay, I have to go. Bye Alfendi! Love you!"

"You too." I hanged up.

"Who was that?" Hilda asked.

"My dad," I replied stiffly. I put the phone in my pocket.

"How come you never-sniff-talk about your family?" Florence rubbed her nose with a tissue.

"Uh...I don't know." Please don't ask about them, please don't ask about them! "I just..." I shrugged. There really was no way to explain it without actually saying who my family was.

"Who are they?" Sniffer asked.

Of course they asked. "Um...My sister's name is Flora...And my dad is...Professor Layton?" I could barely finish the sentence.

"Really?" Hilda exclaimed. "Cool!"

I cringed.

"Why were you so nervous about telling us, though?"

I bit my lip and considered how to answer. "Well...Uh...Lots of people compare me to my dad, and it's in a bad way 'cause I really don't act like him or look like him. The only things we have in common is that I like tea, and I'm pretty good at puzzles."

"Oh." Hilda's tail drooped.

Lucy seemed to hesitate over a few words. Then she just didn't say anything.

* * *

A week flew by without anything interesting happening. I was definitely used to the weird, non-human creatures of the school. And then, it was the weekend again. And my father wasn't busy, so he visited me. Do you know how awkward that is?!

"Hi Al!" he exclaimed.

I was outside with him and my other friends.

"Hiiiii..."

My father didn't seem to notice Hilda's cat ears. That was good. Or maybe he already knew about it. Small talk happened. After a while, though, he had to leave.

"He didn't even notice your cat ears," I remarked.

Hilda shrugged. "He probably knew that this was a school for humanoids when he enrolled you."

"Oh." I rubbed the back of my neck. "Yeah, that would make sense."

**~I don't really know what Professor Layton is like. -_- I just looked him up on Wikipedia. I have no idea if he has any verbal tics or anything like that. And putting Lucifendi is so hard. 0_o How about they just get back to the "ghost" problem...~**


	6. Chapter 7

"We should go somewhere," Sniffer said. "I'm kind of getting bored."

"There's that, you know, outdoors shopping center." Dustin shrugged.

"I'll have to change, but okay." Hilda left.

"And we all need to get money," Lucy said.

We walked to our rooms.

"Uh, how do we get there?" I asked Dustin kind of awkwardly.

"You c'n walk there from 'ere," Dustin replied.

"Oh. Okay." I shoved some cash in my pocket left the school.

Hilda came out of the school with a hat on. Her tail seemed to be gone, probably hidden in her skirt.

We went to the shopping center.

It had a lot of clothing stores, but also a movie theatre, some restaurants, and just...other stores.

"Let's go to that one!" Lucy pointed to a store called Moon Bound.

"What's in there?" I asked her.

"Cool things." Lucy grabbed my arm and dragged me to the store.

"I thought you didn't like shopping," I remarked.

"Well, this is an awesome store. Oh! Look at this!" Lucy ran over to a shelf full of incense. "There of some weird ones here. But the lavender one smells really good." Lucy picked up the stick and put it under my nose. The lavender really did smell good.

"Whoa, cool."

"They also have lots of masks." Lucy ran over to a shelf that was filled with a bunch of masks.

Laughing, I followed her. Lucy was a character.

Lucy put on a mask that was just plain white. It looked kind of creepy. "Hear me roar!" she joked.

Hilda smiled. "Glad you two are getting along." She looked at some rings.

"Oh my gosh!" Lucy exclaimed suddenly. "Hippie headbands!" Lucy put the mask on the rack and grabbed a large, well, hippie headband. "I didn't know they still had these." The hippie headband was pink.

_Strange, _I thought. _She always wears green and if she ever has something on her head, it's pink. Very interesting..._

I looked at some posters for sale. There was one of the human heart, and one of a skull.

"Unicorn." Florence pointed to a large blow-up unicorn head mounted on the wall.

"Well that's very random." I snorted.

Lucy looked at the weird jewelry.

After a while, we checked out. Lucy bought a mood necklace. I really didn't buy anything. We shopped at some other stores, but most of them just sold clothes. I learned that Lucy loved chocolate. (And her necklace turned olive-green, which was the color for "passion". Somehow I memorized the mood chart.) Then we headed back to the school. Lucy unwrapped a chocolate bar.

"Want some?" Lucy held out the chocolate bar.

I shrugged and took a piece. I remembered reading somewhere that there were an average of eight insect legs in each candy bar. Gotta get that protein, I guess. Still, it was some pretty good chocolate.

* * *

The next day (Monday), in the middle of math class, the power suddenly went out. It turned back on a few seconds later.

I looked at Lucy. Her mood necklace was orange (fear). Apparently, I had grabbed her hand in the darkness. I didn't even really notice it.

We both turned pink, and I let go. "Sorry," I muttered.

Lucy laughed nervously. Then she realized something. Her eyes widened. "Do you think that were the 'ghosts'?" Lucy whispered, making quotation marks in the air.

I shrugged. _Smart girl,_ remarked my potty side. _She would be a good detective, I think._

I went back to my math work.

Someone tapped on my shoulder. I turned around and looked at Sniffer.

"Where's Justin?" Sniffer whispered.

"I-What?"

"Justin. He's not here."

I blinked. That was very suspicious. Or maybe it was just a coincidence. "That's weird..."

Sniffer nodded.

"Alfendi, turn around," Mr. Sasacusa said.

I turned around and hastily resumed my work.

* * *

Friday. (There had been a few ghost attacks that week, but we were no closer to figuring out who was behind them. The only evidence we had was Justin's mysterious disappearance and the ghosts themselves. The real ones, I mean.)

There was a talent show. We all kind of had to go to it.

"Where's Lucy?" I asked Dustin.

Dustin shrugged. "Why? Ya wanna see the lass?"

"I'm not in love," I said. My red hair fell over my eyes.

Dustin smirked. "Didn't say it then."

I didn't have a reply to that. My placid side returned.

"Welcome to the Makepeace High Talent Show!" Mr. Mann said into the microphone. I couldn't help but staring at his high heels. Mr. Mann always wore the latest fashion...For women's shoes. Maybe that was a warlock thing...? I shook my head and paid attention to what he was saying.

"For our first act we have Dolly Hollerday singing a song called Macho Man (In a White Gown)."

Dolly came on stage. She started singing her song. I had to admit, Dolly sang pretty good. The creepy thing was...Her song made lots of references to getting arrested.

After that I witnessed more singing (what's with people and Let It Go?!), a few comedian jokes, acrobatics, and acting. Then...

"And last, but not least, we have Lucy Baker with her dance routine!"

I choked on my spit. Lucy was in the talent show?! Mr. Mann walked off the stage, heels clicking behind him.

I gaped at the stage. Lucy was there in a flowing green dress with spaghetti straps. Lucy was also barefoot. The two locks of hair that always fell in front of her shoulders were curled.

Music started playing in the background. Lucy closed her eyes and started doing the dance I saw on that full moon night.

The music faded away. Lucy looked at the crowd.

Claps. Whistles. Lucy, grinning madly, walked off the stage.

"Whoa..." I breathed.

Lucy won the talent show. Dolly Hollerday was placed second. I found Lucy after the show.

"Lucy that was amazing!" I exclaimed.

Lucy blushed. "Ta..."

It was cute how she said "thank you".

Wait, cute? What? Darn it. I was all lovey-dovey again...

"You look, uh, pretty in your dress." I awkwardly rubbed the back of my neck.

Lucy scratched her arm. I wanted to say something to her, but I didn't know what. I never really had an interest in girls until I met Lucy. Well, I just had to be frank.

"Uh...Lucy...Do you want to be my...uh...girlfriend?"

Lucy nodded with a large grin on her face. And then she kissed me.

* * *

**The shopping center they went to is based on this place in Shreveport, Louisiana (a town next to where I used to live) called The Boardwalk. ****I like that place. 0_o**

**Also Moon Bound is based on a store called Earthbound. ****It's the only place I get all girly over clothes. ****Earthbound is my favorite store other than Books-A-Million and Barnes &amp; Noble.**

**I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT MACHO MAN SOUNDS LIKE. :P**

**Randal Mann is funny to me. I don't know why. And he is fun to draw.**

**Randal Mann: Even I hate dresses. -_-**

**It's weird that Lucy calls Alfendi "Al", but I can't think of a way for her to say "Prof". Like what kid calls their boyfriend "Prof"?!**

**I'm glad that Al &amp; Lucy finally got together.**

**IT WAS AWKWARD BUT STILL. ****Awkward = realistic. (That's what I think.)**


	7. Chapter 8

Yes, I was dating Lucy. But I wasn't going to give up on finding the "ghosts". (I don't know why I felt so determined about this. Perhaps I should become a detective when I grow up! I do like murder mysteries.) And I felt very suspicious of Justin. But how would I figure out what to do with that?

That morning I woke up to all the shoes in the room filled with jam.

"How did that happen?" I muttered. "They really need to put locks on the doors."

Dustin shook his head. He grabbed a pair of shoes he was going to wear and went to the bathroom to wash off the jam. I picked up some red Converse and washed off the jam in the sink after Dustin finished. It made my shoes wet, but it was better than sticky. I set my shoes up on the window sill, hoping it would dry faster.

"I 'eard you're dating Lucy," Dustin remarked.

I nodded.

"Awesome! Since when?"

"Yesterday." Oh no! That made me sound kind of shallow. Like I just liked her because she could dance...

"I knew you always liked t' lass," replied Dustin.

Good. I didn't sound as shallow as I thought I would. Wait, what? I always liked her? No I didn't. But...Oh well.

Someone knocked on the door. I opened it. Lucy was there.

"That 'ghost'-" she made quotation marks in the air "-put pink hair dye in Dolly's hair!"

"What the heck? They put jam in our shoes."

"We should have another talk with Diane," Lucy whispered. "She might know something else."

I nodded. "Dustin I have to go..." I trailed off.

Dustin nodded.

I went into the bathroom and changed. Then I put on my shoes despite the wetness.

Lucy and I walked to the basement door, holding hands. Lucy looked around. When she made sure no one was there, Lucy opened the door. We hurried down before anyone could notice.

"Diane?" Lucy called.

The ghost of Diane Makepeace appeared through a doorway. "What?"

"Are you POSITIVE no one goes upstairs?" Lucy asked.

Diane nodded. "I'm one-hundred percent sure. Why?"

"There's been lots of ghost attacks since we talked," Lucy replied.

Diane slapped her forehead. "I hate who's behind this. I don't know who it is, but I hate them."

"How would we stop them, though?" I asked. "Personally, I'm suspicious of Justin."

"Justin?" Lucy raised an eyebrow. "Well, he's been acting weird lately..."

"Who's this Justin?" Diane asked.

"He's a friend," replied Lucy. "And he's really suspicious. But do you think he really could be behind it?" Lucy looked at me.

I shrugged. "Who knows? What we need is a plan...Anyone have an idea?"

Lucy and Diane shook their heads.

I sighed.

* * *

Sunday.

I flopped down in bed.

"Wot's wrong?" Dustin asked.

"I just don't know what to do about this ghost thing."

Dustin shrugged. "Maybe we should meet up or something like that."

I sat up. "Actually, that's a great idea! We can go to the library 'cause practically no one goes there."

Dustin nodded. "I'll get the others."

We met in the library ten minutes later.

"Justin can't come," Sniffer explained. "He's busy or sick or something. I honestly have no idea. He just said that he couldn't come."

I rubbed my chin. "That's...suspicious. No offense Sniffer."

Sniffer shrugged.

"What should we do 'bout the ghosts?" Dustin asked.

Florence sneezed. "I don't know. I mean, it's probably not a real ghost...But how do we stop a fake ghost person?"

"Have you not seen Scooby Doo?" Hilda asked. "We should build a trap, of course."

"How would you do that...?" I asked her.

Hilda shrugged. "Well where do you think they'd strike next?"

"Is there a dance or something soon?" Lucy asked.

Everyone looked at her with a confused expression, even me.

"No seriously! Listen. They might try another attack if all the students are in one place."

"That's genius," Dustin replied.

Hilda pursed her lips. "Let's see...Well, they probably have a Halloween dance. That's not even close, though. It's not even September yet."

I rubbed my chin. "We can't wait until then...Or maybe we can...Gah! I don't know."

"Now we know where we all stand," Hilda remarked. "We have no idea what to do."

Sniffer sighed. "Now what?"

"Meeting adjourned, I guess," Florence said.

We all went back to our rooms.

And we all saw something from the ghost.

* * *

"Twice in one weekend!" Lucy grumbled.

"They put fake BLOOD on our window." I crossed my arms and glared through my red hair. "Now it looks like we murdered someone! And I'll have you know that even though I like murder mysteries, I wouldn't actually cause the murder."

"And we got a freaky doll just standing near the door." Hilda brandished a doll that looked like it was from a horror movie.

"I nearly had a heart attack!" Florence added.

"And I STILL don't know where Justin is!" Sniffer shook his head.

I glanced at Lucy. Should we tell him our suspicions? Lucy just shrugged as if she knew exactly what I was thinking, but she didn't know what to do about it, either.

"Hey guys!" Justin walked up to us all casually. "Whoa, that's a freaky doll, Hilda."

"It's from the ghost!" Hilda hissed like a cat. "We had another attack!"

"Uh-oh. Really?"

Sniffer nodded. "You didn't see it, though. Where were you, anyways?"

"I had a doctor's appointment. For shots." Justin shrugged.

Instinctively, I looked at his arm. No bandages. Very interesting...

"I guess that's good, though," Justin said. "I won't get sick and I didn't see-What even happened in our room, Sniffer?"

"They freaking did graffiti on the wall!" I've never seen Sniffer actually angry.

"Should I confront Justin?" I whispered into Lucy's ear. My placid side returned, luckily. I didn't want to do anything I might regret.

Lucy shook her head.

Sniffer said, "We have to catch this ghost soon..."

* * *

**Dang writers' block. You s****ee I've been thinking at what they do in Scooby Doo &amp; stuff &amp; stuff...Well I've never searched for ghosts so like yeah. Perhaps I should try it sometime...**


	8. Chapter 9

**I changed the rating to T 'cause now that I think about it, fake blood, a gay warlock, and a school named after two serial killers would probably make this rated T. e.e**

* * *

I hate Mondays. And it's worse when you still have traces of fake blood on your window. It seriously looked like I murdered someone. And in this weird school, murder didn't seem really unlikely.

I changed into my clothes and went to the cafeteria for breakfast.

"Guys, I have an idea," I whispered. I glanced around from eavesdroppers. "Justin is suspicious, right? We shouldn't tell him our plans 'cause he could prepare for them, and then we'd never figure out if he's behind it or not."

"But...But that's mutiny," Sniffer replied in a whisper. He didn't like the idea of hiding something from his room-mate. I felt kind of sorry for doing that to him.

Hilda shrugged. "I think Alfendi's right. Sorry Sniff."

"Now we just need a plan." Lucy sighed.

Justin sat down, putting our conversation to a halt (not like we were getting anywhere with it).

"Hey guys," he said.

Everyone acted natural, which didn't come off as really natural. (It's always hard to act natural when you're trying. How does that work out?) Luckily Justin didn't notice. Or maybe he was pretending not to notice.

I thought about the Halloween dance, and Lucy's idea that we should put up a trap then. It was a really good idea, but that was so long from now. We couldn't just wait for that long! There was a crazy guy (who very well might be my friend, but I wasn't certain) on the loose! I had no idea what to do. Neither did my potty side. We both were annoyed about that.

Gah! Why did it feel like I was in charge of this weird mystery?! I mean I wasn't. Not really. But somehow it felt like I had to control everything in this case. Or at least most of it.

I just ate my breakfast. Maybe inspiration-or more clues-would come if I just waited patiently.

* * *

It was later at night. I stared at a notebook where I had written all kinds of clues and things about the ghosts.

"This ghost thing is really bothering you," Dustin remarked, climbing into bed.

"I know! It's so weird! And I don't know WHY, either. I just feel like I have to solve it." I frowned. "One thing I've learned from this is that I probably should be a detective when I grow up 'cause I just feel like I have to solve cases."

Dustin shrugged. "That'd be a fun job I guess. Personally, I ain't good at that, really...But I'd like to be in the detective place, you know. I'm not good at science stuff. Maybe I could be, like, a sketch artist or janitor or something..."

"That would be cool!" I replied. "Then you wouldn't solve the murders, but you'd get to hear about them and stuff."

"Well, we should get to sleep," Dustin said.

"Yeah." I put my notebook under my bed and rolled over. Dustin turned off the lights.

"Night," Dustin muttered.

"Night."

* * *

Tuesday.

I was walking after school with Lucy (because we were heading outside). I tripped over my own feet and fell on my face.

"SANDWICH!" Lucy exclaimed, purposely falling on top of me. Lucy laughed insanely.

My potty side appeared. "Lucy! Get off of me!" I exclaimed. I blew some red hair out of my face and tried to get up. Lucy wasn't fat or anything, but it was still hard to stand up when she was lying on top of me. Maybe she had lots of muscle (because muscles are heavier than fat).

Lucy snorted and rolled off of me. She helped me up.

"Did you drink coffee today or something?" I asked. My placid side returned, so I said it in a calm-ish, polite-ish way.

Lucy shook her head. We continued walking outside. The breeze ruffled my hair.

"It's beautiful outside!" Lucy exclaimed, spinning around.

I chuckled and stared at Lucy. She really was beautiful, and she didn't even use make-up!

"Al, wot are you looking at me like that for?" Lucy asked.

"Nothing." I rubbed the back of my neck. My cheeks started heating up.

Lucy shrugged.

A wolf ran around the building. I stared at it with wide eyes. "Who's that?!"

"Oh, that's Bingo," Lucy replied with a shrug. "He's a wairwulf-um, summat like a reverse werewolf. On the day and night of a full moon, Bingo turns into a human, but 'e still looks summat like a dog if you ask me."

"Cool." I rubbed my chin. It was weird. I was getting used to hearing strange things like that. If someone said something like that at the beginning of the school year, I would have thought they were joking or just off their heads, but now I just think it's interesting. This school was doing something to me...

We sat down on the bench and looked at the clouds.

"Hey Lucy?"

Lucy looked up at me.

"I know this is completely random and off topic, but what do you think we should do about the ghosts?"

Lucy shrugged. "Honestly, Al, I don't know. It would be cool to do the trap idea, but the dance is kinda far away." Lucy frowned. "I know!" After glancing around for eavesdroppers, Lucy whispered into my ear, "Next time there's a fake ghost haunting, we can check the area for any clues or summat."

"That's a great idea!" I exclaimed.

Lucy grinned.

We continued chatting until the wind picked up and started freezing our arms. I grabbed Lucy's hand, and we went inside.

"Bye Al." Lucy kissed me on the cheek and walked to her room.

Crap. Now I was blushing again. I headed back to my room. Thank goodness Dustin wasn't there at the time. He would have noticed my bright red cheeks or wondered why I was outside for so long.


	9. Chapter 10

**Sorry this took so long. 0_o It's because of the usual reasons: writer's block, procrastination, distraction, school...**

* * *

Friday. At lunch, Lucy showed up with a bandage wrapped around her right hand.

"What happened?" I exclaimed with a little too much nervousness in my voice.

"Nowt, really." Lucy waved dismissively as she sat down. "I just touched a metal I'm allergic to, is all. It's summat like werewolves and silver...only I'm definitely not a werewolf, and it weren't silver."

"Oh." I stared at my lunch.

"Is the Diablo!" some boy yelled with a thick Spanish accent. He flew around the room. The boy looked Spanish, too.

"Is that guy a superhero or something?" I asked, pointing.

Hilda nodded. "His name is Chico. He's obsessed with some sort of demon called the Diablo. Also he likes masks. Like, a lot."

"Because that makes total sense." I shook my head.

"Yeah." Hilda flicked her cat tail. "Chico's kinda weird. The weirdest people are them." Hilda pointed to a table with four people. They seem pretty normal (compared to the other people in Makepeace High). I recognized a few of them, but I didn't know any of their names

"Ee, they're annoying," Lucy muttered. "Think they're all popular 'n' junk..."

"Like a chick-flick?" I grimaced. I'd always hated those kinds of movies because I thought they weren't realistic. Apparently I was wrong. "That's just great."

Lucy nodded. "It gets pretty annoying."

"Okay, so it's near the end of September," Hilda said, all business. "We should start figuring out what we should dress as for the Halloween dance."

"I'm going as myself," I replied with a frown. I never liked the idea of dressing up for Halloween.

"Actually, I might do that too," Lucy said. She rubbed her chin and considered the idea.

"And what would 'yourself' be?" Sniffer asked. He rested his chin on his hand.

"Can't a secret stay a secret?" Lucy asked in an exasperated tone.

* * *

"I still don't understand why people take a part in this," I murmured, following my friends in the Halloween store. "It's impractical."

Lucy slid her hand into mine. "I honestly don't know."

"Just roll wit' it," Dustin replied. He pulled a vampire costume from the racks of costumes. "Okay, no vampire wears this outfit. It's completely ridiculous."

"I should know," Lucy muttered. She didn't say anything else because we were in public with other humans, but everyone knew what she meant.

"Is the adorable couple dressing up?" Hilda asked, eyeing Lucy and me.

My hair turned scarlet and fell over my face. "Hilda, just because you're my friend does not mean I won't hesitate to cut your tongue out!" This actually wasn't true, but I had a reputation to keep up.

Hilda snorted, but I could see fear in her eyes. Lucy was the only one not freaked out by my potty side. "Okay, in all seriousness, are you gonna dress up?"

"Definitely a no." I pushed my purple hair out of my face.

"Probably not," Lucy replied. Her eyes seemed distant, like she was thinking about something.

"Hey, look at that!" Hilda pointed to a cat burglar costume. "This is perfect. I can be a cat burglar cat!" She picked up the costume and put it over her arm.

"Maybe I could be a pinata," Florence said. "Except that I don't want someone to hit me with a stick until candy-achoo!-falls out of me."

I laughed.

"_I'm_ dressing as The Joker," Justin remarked. He picked up a costume.

"That guy is really freaky," Sniffer replied. "I mean, have you _seen_ his Wikipedia page?" Sniffer shuddered, and I wondered what exactly it said. I would have to look that up later.

"I 'ave an idea!" Dustin exclaimed. "A'ight, you know those people from Nightmare B'Fore Christmas-Lock, Shock, and Barrel? Well, since you two aren't dressin' up-" Dustin pointed at Lucy and me. "-and you don't know what to dress as-" Dustin pointed to Sniffer and Florence. "-why don't we dress like them?"

"That's perfect!" Florence exclaimed. "But I don't think Shock-or whatever one's the witch girl-has an IV."

"I call Lock," Sniffer blurted.

"I wanted to be Lock," Dustin mourned. "He's a handsome devil."

Sniffer stuck out his tongue childishly, causing all of us to laugh.

* * *

I stared at my phone with an expression of shock on my face.

"Wot?" Dustin asked. "Wot the 'eck are you looking at?"

"The Joker's Wikipedia page," I replied. "Sniffer was right-he's scary."

* * *

**Why do I keep centering my stories around Halloween?! What the heck?! ****I mean, I like Halloween as much as the next guy, I guess, but why does this keep happening?!**

**I was looking at a ton of Halloween costumes for inspiration. So many people dress as loofahs. T_T**

**Random quote that I felt I needed to make known:**

**"Pizza delivery is the answer."~Alfendi Layton**


	10. Chapter 11

"Ya sure ya want to go as yerself?" Dustin asked. "I think Hilda would be glad to help ya with a last-minute costume."

I shook my head. "Honestly, I don't want to come, but-"

"But Lucy's there," Dustin finished.

I decided not to say that he was 100% correct.

Dustin's Barrel costume looked kind of weird, but it would probably look better when he was with Sniffer and Florence. We walked to the gym, where the dance was being held. Loud music played in the background. Florence waved. She was with the others, but I couldn't find Lucy.

"Where's Lucy?" I asked.

Hilda shrugged. "No clue. Maybe she's still in her room."

I looked at Sniffer, Dustin, and Florence. They looked a lot like Lock, Shock, and Barrel. I realized they looked like that normally, too. Three friends. One's the youngest. The girl is the oldest (and smartest).

Then I turned my gaze to Justin and Hilda. Justin was pretty creepy-looking; he made a good Joker. (I never really liked superheroes, but I'm basing that on what I've seen on Wikipedia.)

Lucy walked into the gym wearing a green halter top and white pants. Pink wings came from her back. I gaped at her as she ran over to the group.

"Hi!" Lucy exclaimed.

No reply.

"Snap out of it!" Lucy crossed her arms. "It's just wings. A lot of other people here have wings. It's nowt!"

I laughed. It was kind of hard to stop looking at Lucy's wings, but I managed to distract myself.

"I'm going to get a soda. Do you want anything?"

Lucy shook her head.

"Okay."

I walked to the food table (or whatever you called it) and poured myself some soda. When I came back, some guy in a Phantom of the Opera outfit was talking to Lucy. She seemed annoyed at him, and the guy sounded like he was flirting. I walked over to Lucy. She made a point of kissing me on the lips in front of the guy. Annoyed, he left.

"Who's that?" I asked.

"Roscoe Strapping." Lucy made a face. "Flirts way too much. Cheated on his girlfriend 'til she committed suicide two years ago."

"Wow."

"I don't even know _what_ he sees in me," Lucy muttered.

"Hey, there's a ton of lovable things about you!" I felt my cheeks heat up. Was I really saying this? I smiled sheepishly at her.

"Yeah, but you know my personality and stuff. He doesn't even know me."

Lucy and I really didn't dance much, but Lucy dragged me into a conga line. She just laughed at my threats. The dance was almost over; I worried the ghost attack wouldn't happen, and we'd just have to live with our suspicions instead of solving the ghost mystery.

Then it actually happened. The power went out first. Everyone was shocked. Gasps could be heard. I groped around in the darkness until I found Lucy. Suddenly there was a small amount of light. It was Lucy's wings, which apparently made light when they were flapping fast enough.

"That's cool," I murmured.

Lucy nodded. "We gotta get over to wherever they control the power."

We made our way out of the gym. It was dark everywhere, but Lucy kept her wings beating.

"Probably in that basement," Lucy muttered, "but I don't know how Justin even got in there."

So Lucy and I walked to the door of the basement. I had no clue where the others were. The door was broken down. Lucy and I glanced at each other, knowing what this meant. We headed downstairs, and Lucy stopped flapping her wings to prevent Justin (or anyone else) from seeing us.

A flashlight beam swept across the room. I held my breath. Someone made their way out of the basement. They didn't see us, probably because they seemed focused on something else.

Someone in a Joker costume.

* * *

The gym looked like it was full of ghosts, but I knew it had to be fake. Everyone could see them, and not one of them looked like Diane Makepeace.

"It's all just a trick," I muttered.

Lucy nodded.

A figure moved from the shadows. I ran to catch up with him. With my awkwardly long legs, it was easy. I grabbed his arm.

Justin Lawson glared at me. He punched me in the arm and ran. My hair turned red.

"Al, go turn on the power again," Lucy whispered. "I'll stop him..."

I ran to the basement again. There were lots of switches, and it was dark. How did Justin even know which switches controlled the power? I started flipping switches at random until the lights came on again. Then I ran back upstairs.

Justin had a gun. Where the hell did he get a gun? I slowly approached him. Lucy stood at the door. Her hands were lifted over her head. Justin's grip on the gun tightened. My mind was spinning.

Lucy would get shot-

She would die-

Justin's a murderer-

Words I shouldn't know-

"Lucy!" I exclaimed, running towards her.

Justin fired the gun. I knocked Lucy down, and we avoided the bullet just in time.

"WHAT'S GOING ON HERE?!" someone yelled. Mr. Chan. Oh thank goodness.

Justin whirled around and pointed the gun at Mr. Chan.

"Don't. Move."

"Justin!" Sniffer looked horrified. His friend had a gun pointed to the Vice-Principal of the school. I felt sorry for Sniffer.

Lucy stood up and pushed Justin with strength I never saw in her before. He fell on his face, and the gun fired into a wall. Mr. Chan quickly apprehended Justin.

"I think he was the one who made this school seem like it was haunted." I glared at Justin. "Didn't you?"

Justin glared back with his one eye that could open.

"Why would someone even do that?"

Justin and I kept staring, almost daring each other to look away first.

"He's probably a sociopath or something," Mr. Chan muttered. "We always get the sociopaths in our school."

Suddenly, I felt nauseous.

"Al, are you okay?" Lucy asked, grabbing my arm.

"Yes...I'm fine..." My hair turned purple again. "That was the longest time I've gone as my other personality..."

Justin said something that I should not put in this story because it's worse than a T-rating.


	11. Chapter 12

The doorbell rang. It had to be Lucy! Luke, my father's assistant, was already there, so no one else could be at the door (except for random Christmas-carolers, maybe). I opened the door.

"Hi Al!" Lucy exclaimed. She was wearing a green turtleneck, pink gloves, and a pink hat.

A man and a woman who were probably her parents stood behind her. I could definitely see the family resemblance.

I smiled. "Come in."

They walked through the door. Most people celebrate Christmas with just their family, but since Flora and my father like to invite Luke, they agreed to let me invite Lucy too. I hugged Lucy tightly.

"It's great to see you," I said.

Lucy gripped me tighter.

"Psst, Al."

I looked at Flora. Then she pointed upwards at something in her hand. Lucy and I both glanced up.

Mistletoe.

I kissed Lucy longer than I should have considering our parents (or parent in my case) were watching.

* * *

The lunch was very good. (Most people did Christmas dinner, but we were doing lunch. Don't judge me!) Flora chatted with Luke, and Lucy's parents had an interesting conversation with my father. (They probably were wondering why I looked nothing like my father and who my mother was. Everyone did. Luckily, they were polite, and they didn't ask. I've had some awkward conversations about things like that...)

"Let's go to the living room," I said. Lucy and I sat down on the couch.

"Where do you think the others are?" I wondered out loud. "Well, Justin's definitely in jail."

Lucy nodded. "Sniffer, Florence, 'n' Dusty are probably celebrating together. I have no idea about Hilda, though."

"Me either."

"You coming back to Makepeace High next year?" Lucy asked.

"My father said I would go there until college." I smiled.

"Great! I wish there was a Makepeace College. A school full of people who aren't human is really interesting."

"Especially if it's haunted," I joked.

Lucy laughed.

* * *

"It's beautiful!"

Lucy held a necklace I gave her. I helped her tie it around her neck.

"Thanks Prof-" Her cheeks turned red. "I mean Al."

"Prof? What's that all about?"

"Well, um...Okay, I'm writing this story, and the main character is summat like you. 'E just has split personalities and a cowlick, is all."

Without thinking, I touched the curl on my head.

"And he goes by Prof, so..." Lucy rubbed the back of her head. "Sorry."

"It's okay."

"Really? Can I call you Prof, then?"

"Why not?" I didn't think my father would approve, though (especially considering he was a real professor).

"Here's my gift to you," Lucy said. She handed me a wrapped box.

Slowly, I unwrapped it. Inside was a plain box. I took off the lid. A white lab coat was folded inside.

"This is awesome!" I exclaimed, picking it up. I pulled the lab coat on. It fit perfectly.

"I knew you'd like it!"

I hugged Lucy and kissed her on the forehead.

"Alfendi, one of your friends called you." My father handed me the phone.

"Hello?" I asked.

"Hiii!" Florence's voice crackled over the phone. Then I heard a sneeze. "I need you and Lucy to come outside."

"Wait...How did you get this number?"

"Just come outside!" Florence hung up suddenly.

"That was Florence she said I needed to go outside. You too, Lucy."

Lucy glanced at her parents, and they nodded. I grabbed Lucy's hand and walked outside without getting my coat. (And my lab coat wasn't the warmest jacket in the world.)

"Hi Al!" Hilda exclaimed.

All my friends (well, except Justin) were outside.

"How did you get this address?" I asked.

"Magic," Sniffer joked.

"We wanted to see you!" Dustin said. He looked at Lucy. "Dolly can't come because she celebrates holidays by sleeping during the day and partying during the night. Vampire thing, I suppose."

"It's so good to see you guys," I said.

"Also, we're wanting to know if you can come with us to visit Justin in jail." Sniffer put his hands in his pockets.

* * *

Justin sat down on a stool behind the window slot of the prisoner visiting area. I ignored conversations between family and other teen convicts.

"Um...Hi guys." He looked nervous. The Joker costume was gone (I wondered what his mugshot looked like), replaced by a jail uniform.

"Merry Christmas!" Sniffer shouted. "It's really good to see you. I was wondering how you were doing. School is _boring_ without you! (And that has absolutely nothing to do with the fake ghosts.)"

Justin scowled at the mention of the ghosts. I was tempted to ask him about his motive, but I decided it wouldn't be the best idea.

Sniffer swallowed. "Well...How are you doing? Besides the fact that you're in Juvee." He laughed nervously.

"It's fine," Justin said. We could all tell that there was something different about him. Still, we tried acting like he was our same old friend who didn't try to shoot my girlfriend or make the school seem haunted for apparently no reason.

"Yesterday we did a musical for Christmas Eve. And I got to sleep in later 'cause they took off the alarms. Other than that, nothing's new..." Justin still looked nervous (as did everyone else).

Awkward silence hung in the air.

"How are you, er, doing?" Justin rubbed the back of his neck.

Everyone muttered that they were doing good.

Except Sniffer. He excitedly told about everything that happened in his life since Justin was arrested.

"Oh. Cool."

I looked at my watch. "Oh, wow. It's getting late. I gotta go." (And this wasn't a lie to avoid more awkwardness.)

We started to leave.

"Wait."

We came back.

"Merry Christmas." Justin smiled a genuine smile which I never saw before in my life.

Sniffer put his face against the glass wall.

"Sniffer, we have to go," Florence said.

Dustin grabbed Sniffer's arm. "It's gettin' late."

"BYE JUSTIN!" Sniffer yelled as we left.

Justin put his hand against the glass. Sniffer had tears in his eyes (happiness and sadness). I glanced at Justin. He looked like he was about to cry. But, because he looked tough and probably wanted people to think he was tough, I didn't tell anyone else.

* * *

**I get very emotional with Sniffer &amp; Justin friendship stuff. *puts hand over heart* *chokes on tears***

**Anywhoozles, um...**

**THE END.**


End file.
